Clay Fun Art by Oak Meadow – My Review

Do your little ones struggle with handwriting? Is it hard for them to hold their pencil, to form their letters? We all know that arts and crafts are a great way to develop the small muscles of the hand for handwriting. Drawing, cutting, working with pastels, painting, and even finger painting in pudding can really help. But have you ever thought of having your little ones work with clay?

Making things with clay (or play dough) is a great way to strengthen the wrist and the small muscles of the hand. And Oak Meadow, one of our favorite educational publishers, has just the thing for that. It’s called Clay Fun, and it is full of creative, easy to do projects – to make out of clay or even play dough.

~ Don’t miss the fun giveaway from Oak Meadow at the end! ~

Clay Fun includes the following:

1. Suggested Basic Tools List

2. A brief history of Clay

3. Kneading Clay instructions

4. Scratch and Glue instructions

5. 21 easy to do, fun clay projects

There is a brief definition of clay, with a short history of clay as well, in the introduction to Clay Fun. It is written to the student, in a sweet, gentle tone, just for them, including:

“Clay is found in the skin of the earth. All over the world there are pockets of clay. The finest particles of earth make up these pockets. Mountains are ground into rocks, rocks are ground into sand, and sand is ground into clay. Clay is washed down rivers and formed clay pockets..etc.”

This makes Clay Fun into a simple unit study for your family!

I love how each project comes with easy to follow, step by step instructions. Here’s one for making Animals:

Here’s the suggested tools list, all stuff that you can find around your home:

1. A thick dowel or rolling pin

2. A large needle

3. A paintbrush

4. Newspaper for drying

Here’s another Clay project, making a Cornucopia, and it comes with easy to follow instructions, too:

Wouldn’t your children be proud to show their Clay Cornucopia off, to holiday visitors?

Each of these Clay Fun projects can be enjoyed by kids of all ages. It could become a family project! Your whole homeschool could take a Clay Fun break, in the afternoons!

Each of the 21 projects can just be air dried, for keeping.

If you are looking for a fun way to strengthen the small muscles of the hand and a fun art program for the whole family to do, my family recommends Clay Fun by Oak Meadow. For more information, or how to order this book, just go to Oak Meadow. Oak Meadow also produces lovely, gentle, child-oriented, hands-on curriculum for all ages (preschool to high school) For more information, go to www.oakmeadow.com.

Betsy is a veteran homeschooler who loves unit studies and hands-on learning, mixed in with Charlotte Mason approaches. She homeschooled her daughter from preschool through high school, and helped her get accepted to mulitple colleges. Betsy blogs about her journey at BJ's Homeschool about the early years, high school and college too. A former O. T, she also writes about special needs, and is on the team at the GIfted Homeschool Forum. Betsy is the author of "Homeschooling High School with College in Mind" and also is a homeschool consultant.

My favorite crafts this year have been doing mosaic terra cotta pots using painted eggshells while studying the Byzantine empire with my boys and teaching them how to crochet and knit (all in the name of building better fine motor skills!). I love arts and crafts, but confess that I lack inspiration most of the time!

My husband is artistic and he and our 5yo son will draw and paint together for hours. But I was never very artistic and am only giving it a second go now that I have a child to do it with 🙂 He and I will mostly work with clay, or constructing dolls and puppets from random trash (old clothing/toilet paper tubes/etc.). I like to think he gets two entries into creating things through our different sensibilities. Thank you for the review! We will have to add this to our homeschool 🙂

I have a daughter who has been really into making things with clay and I think she would really love this – it would be so much better to have something that’s more like curriculum rather than the grown-up sculpting books we’ve found!

How nice that your daughter loves clay! Thanks for stopping by, GG. My daughter loved working with clay as well, but we really needed simple directions, and didn’t like the sculpting books either. Clay Fun has a nice approach that I think that your daughter would like.

we are finishing up some nature stories focusing on deer and my daughter wants to make a clay deer! oh dear. i have no idea how to approach it. been thinking about it and perusing Pinterest for ideas! great time to win this book!!!!

My daughter loves the Oak Meadow Curriculum, it has helped me build her self confidence and knowledge by doing seemingly simple school projects. We haven’t tried working with clay yet but I think she would have a blast, thanks for the give away.

Thanks for sharing, Elaina K, and it’s so nice to meet another Oak Meadow family! We also found their project-oriented approach to be a great for my daughter. We especially liked their science and nature activities.

My kids (5 and 3) love all arts and crafts. It is there go to thing to do at home. We plan on homeschooling starting next fall for 1st grade, and this would be an excellent learning tool to have in our curriculum!

That is so nice that your little ones enjoy arts and crafts! I like how they are incoorporated into so much of the Oak Meadow curriculum, even in the later years. It is exciting to hear of your plans to start Oak Meadow first grade next year. Thanks for stopping by, Ami!

Currently our favorite crafts are sewing and paper crafts. My son has become a more reluctant crafter, but if he incorporates math or even Star Wars into whichever project we’re doing or methods/materials we’re exploring he’s much more enthusiastic. I’m very intrigued by the Clay Fun book because we have little experience with clay and based on your comments about muscle development it would be wonderful while we’re learning knitting!

Susie, I like how you incorporate Starts Wars and other things, to make crafts more meaningful for your son. Working with clay helped to strengthen my daughter’s hand muscles, and made it easier for her to learn handwriting. How cool that you related that to knitting, and thanks for sharing your creative ideas!

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name *

Email *

Website

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

We are a veteran group of home educators with a mission – to spread the word about our favorite curricula and help YOU make informed decisions for your homeschool. Meet the review authors and browse the homeschooling tips they share!